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Stop and Smell the Roses - Breaks in Gameplay
A good designer knows that the action in the game needs to be broken up. Breaks in the gameplay, such as the character traveling through a field on horseback or the player themselves stopping to examining scenery, can give the player a chance to refocus and recharge. Many of these moments are found in Action Adventure games that contain long hours of gameplay. It’s important to try to encourage the player to enjoy the world they are in rather than having them jumping from battle to battle. Examples Skyrim The game design flow in Skyrim does an excellent job by balancing the player's experience across a variety of scenes. Once a player clears a dungeon or kills a dragon during a long fight, the game feel transitions to a peaceful atmosphere. The designers accomplish this by changing the music from intense battle to peaceful traveling. This break in intense gameplay allows the player to enjoy the beauty that is Skyrim, with the sounds and visuals of mountains and rivers. This also gives the player the option to explore and adventure at their will because the break encourages a mindset of calm. Example Bioshock Infinite: Probably one of the best examples of this concept is in Bioshock Infinite. Despite being an "on-rails" story, Infinite includes segments meant to give the player time to immerse themselves in it's interesting and colorful world. The best example of this is the beach scene. In this scene, the pacing of the story takes a pause and shows not only an interesting slice of it's world, but also takes the moment to communicate more about Elizabeth's personality. It's a peaceful moment in an otherwise violent game. The Vanishing of Ethan Carter In this "walking simulator" there are plenty of puzzles involving murder and revealing information on characters. However, the beautiful environment is what gives the game its real identity, as the assets were created using photogrammetry. The designers clearly wanted the player to explore the world they presented to them with the amount of detail put into even the most remote corners of the environment. The flow of the game is ideal when the player explores, rather than rushing place to place to figure out the mystery - even the soundtrack lends itself to reflection. Final Fantasy XV In this installment of the Final Fantasy franchise, the world is open and highly navigable. In order to go from one area to another, however, the player is meant to drive a car. This is done in a time frame that seems as if it's almost meant to test the player's patience, as travel can take a number of minutes. The world is dense in detail and very visually interesting, however, creating a very relaxing experience. Intense gameplay experienced in combat finds a balancing foil in this traveling mechanic, as users are given the opportunity to admire some of the more beautiful aspects of the game developers' hard work. Assassin's Creed: In Assassins creed, there are moments when a player can stop and take some time to look around the scene thus making them relax and moving them out of the game mode. The game which has so much of combat and action that game designers explicitly keep these moments to make the player feel free while relaxing the nerves hiked up by previous combat or uncertain moments.